It has been a privilege to be able to write a column to members over the last two years and I hope that I have been able to say something of interest.
On the occasion of my last column as President I will summarise what I believe to be some of the achievements and some of the unfinished business of the Society in 2003 and 2004.

Marjory Warren House
The fact that we now own our own premises in Marjory Warren House must be one of the major achievements of the Society and the Honorary Treasurers, the Chief Executives, Richard Lynham and Alex Mair, and our accountant, Susan Cox, deserve our thanks and congratulations for this. It gives us a physical and financial base from which to carry forward our future activities. We have also experienced the transition in the post of Chief Executive from Richard who made an enormous contribution to the Society, to Alex who is helping to take the Society forward to new heights.

Four Councils, one Society
I am also pleased at the way the new constitution with its devolved structures is working. Particularly impressive has been the development of the Councils for England and for Wales. Neither part of the UK had a Council of this type in the past and, more rapidly than anybody expected, they have established strong structures with significant links to the respective Health Departments. Scotland and Northern Ireland already had structures on which to base their new Councils. There is still some fine-tuning to be done, and particularly in the role and work of the Policy Committee. The Policy Committee should not only set BGS Policies for the UK as a whole but should also learn from the different experiences of the four Councils. I know that it’s looking very carefully at these matters. As we move into the future, and as health policies in the four parts of the UK continue to diverge, it is essential that the Society remains the Society for the UK as a whole. One important way of emphasising this is for candidates for the national offices of the Society to come from all parts of the UK.

Making ourselves heard
There are two areas in which the Society has not moved forward as much as I would of hoped. I will give my thoughts on how progress can occur; my successors are of course, free to ignore these. The first is our role as the authoritative voice for the health care of older people. There have been opportunities when the voice of the Society could have been heard, not only making a contribution to the debate, but highlighting the importance of our speciality in the health care of older people. At the time of writing there has been publicity around a Panorama programme on the long term care of older people. The Society has well-established policies on this and a contribution from the Society, either to the programme or in the form of a press statement at the time of the programme, would have been appropriate. Some of the issues require nationwide comment, as in the example quoted, others are of more local interest. In all of these the Society should have a considered opinion which can be added to the debate. I suggest that each National Council should appoint a BGS member as a Public Relations Officer. They would have the role of monitoring the news, both lay and medical, and identifying areas on which the Society would wish to comment. They would develop links with relevant reporters in the local press and broadcasting media and, when appropriate, issue press statements and be available for comment. While the press statements might be written by the local council member, they should be issued by the BGS main office after approval by the Chief Executive and an appropriate senior officer. In this way they would have the full authority of the BGS. We must achieve a higher profile but this should not mean commenting on every topic. Instead we should reserve our fire for those that are most important. Of course it is the media which decides what to publish or broadcast and this depends on what else is in the news on that particular day.

Multi-disciplinary working
The second matter on which progress has been slower than I would have hoped is in multi-disciplinary working. I now better understand some of the sensitivities of our colleagues in the other health and social care professions who are very wary of being subsumed into a medically dominated organisation. We must accept that this is a valid point of view. Part of our debate must be on the nature of the BGS. It was started as and continues to be largely a society of doctors responsible for the care of older people. We could change the constitution and turn it into a society of all health and care professionals. However, I doubt if we would be successful in recruiting large numbers of colleagues from the other professions, partly for the reason already stated, and partly because they already have their own societies or sections of their professional associations. Even if we were successful, we would probably still need to have a section for doctors and there would then be the danger of a new society being formed for doctors responsible for the care of older people. We should consider the formation of an over-arching forum consisting of representatives of all the societies for the professional care of older people. There would be equal representation from each profession and the office bearers, including the chair, would rotate among the professions so that no profession would seem to be dominant. Something similar to this has been tried in the past and has not lasted long. I believe it is worth trying again.

It has been a great honour to be President of the British Geriatrics Society and I have thoroughly enjoyed the term of office. The Society is the membership and it has been a particular pleasure to meet so many members and to be constantly impressed by the ability and commitment that is in the membership of the Society. I thank the Officers, the Chief Executives and all the staff in the office for their constant support and for helping to make the Presidency such a pleasure. The Society has an excellent future under the leadership first of Jeremy and then of Peter, and I wish them, and all the members, well.

Bob Stout